600 comments for the Weekend Thread (yesterday, Saturday). That has to be a record that will stand for a long time here. HOL. So here’s a new, fresh canvas to paint your thoughts upon. The playoff thread will post at 1:00 p.m. CT, an hour and some change before the scheduled kickoff of Sunday’s first of two games today.

I had originally planned to offer up, here, an idea of what Caserio could do to make some wins for several groups of people: Players, fans, Nick as GM, etc. But, after having typed it all out I’ve realized that all of that is unrealistic.

So I spent from about midnight until 4:55 a.m. thinking, Googling for articles, and looking at the 2020 NFL-NFLPA CBA. Here’s the best I could come up with. I feel nothing but hope that it works out for us as Texans fans, but also a sort of whimper’ish resignation that none of this is in our hands and we might just end up very disgusted with an outcome none of us desire to witness. Anyway, this was the last bit I wrote…so now I’m hitting the Publish button at literally 4:59 a.m. Sunday morning.

• If Watson decides to hold out, he can hold out. The club can’t do anything other than assess fines and keep a running tabulation of the amounts Watson would owe.
  • It’s $50,000 per day. This past year, camp began on July 23 for QBs
• The club can go after portions of his signing bonus ($27m was his total signing bonus payout: $13.5m 9-20-2020, $6.75m 10-20-2020, $6.75m 12-20-2020) which the total signing bonus has been fully paid to him already, yet it’s figuratively broken up into certain amounts “on paper” at the factored rate of $5.4m each year in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024.

Source articles for the above section:

• Watson has been paid a $27m signing bonus (Yes, I know, it’s a Mike Florio article).
• Yes, I know, this is also a Mike Florio article, but he’s correct when it comes to the $50,000/per-day fine as I’ve checked it against the new CBA which I have linked to further down the page here.

Here’s the excerpt from the second Florio article article, dated January 9, 2021: Watson also could boycott training camp. Yes, it would cost him $50,000 per day under the 2020 CBA. Yes, the 2020 CBA also prevents the team from waiving those fines if/when he shows up. But if Watson is sufficiently willing to pay the money in order to get out of Houston, that’s his prerogative.

He also would owe the Texans a portion of his signing bonus, if he refuses to practice or play. He has $21.6 million in unearned bonus money, which applies to each of the next four years at $5.4 million per year. Also, his future guarantees could be voided, if he refuses to show up for camp.

In lieu of holding out, Watson could hold in. He could, for example, be injured, or “injured.” He likewise could do the bare minimum, refusing to show up early or stay late or study film or lead his teammates or do anything other than say, “I just work here.”

When considering what Watson will do, it’s relevant to consider what cornerback Jalen Ramsey did once he decided he wanted out of Jacksonville, because both players are represented by David Mulugheta. In Ramsey’s case, however, the desire to get traded arose during the season. The rules made it virtually impossible for Ramsey to leave the team and wait to be traded.

I have glanced at the official, final 2020 NFL-NFLPA CBA PDF. The pertinent pages to look at can be found in:

• Article 4: Player Contract, beginning in Section 9: Forfeiture of Salary which is Page 12 of the PDF.
• Article 42: Club Discipline, page 247 on down through page 254 of the PDF.

Watson and Ramsey share the same agent. I am not so sure that Watson will try the same tactics that Ramsey ultimately was successful with during the bitter, final chunk of time he was with the Jaguars. Stranger things have happened, I suppose, but it doesn’t seem like Deshaun would go that far.

Rumors. Reports. Cryptic tweets. It’s all just a series of dots that any person could attempt to connect, to arrive at a prediction of outcome(s), but nobody will know until we know…which will be followed by more rumors, reports, and cryptic tweets. I just can’t see Deshaun Watson ultimately deciding to stay away from his teammates. Clowney did, and then he returned, but then was traded after what was basically a soft “hold in” during camp. I can’t really see Watson doing the same thing, not when the QB is generally the leader of the entire team. A CB (Ramsey) or a DE/OLB/Edge (Clowney) is not the same thing. Add to that if JJ Watt is moved to another team, I cannot envision Watson adding more salt to that wound on many Texans’ fans heart. I say that…and then look at the bail by Harden, and this was after he had been showing early and consistent excitement for playing alongside Christian Wood and with new HC Silas.

Anything. Can. Happen. And ain’t any of us gonna’ know ’til we know. The “waiting” for the final, real outcome is very difficult for sports fans.

We’ll have a game thread posted at about 2:30 p.m. CT which is around an hour before kickoff between the Rams and Packers at 3:35 p.m. CT.

Final thread for Friday. See y’all Saturday morning for the Weekend Discussion thread and playoff game threads.

There’ll be an Overflow thread, Part II that posts at 4:00 p.m. and I’ll close down this thread at about the same time.

A new thread, the Overflow Thread, will post at 1:00 p.m. CT. Then I’ll hop in and close this thread down. Then there’ll be an Overflow thread, Part II that posts at 4:00 p.m. and I’ll close down the first overflow thread.

New thread. This one stays open for the rest of today and tonight. Starting tomorrow, the daily thread closes at 1:00 p.m. CT. You will need to refresh the home page of the Texans Chat site to see the new thread article that also posts at 1:00 p.m. CT.

Same routine: The first overflow thread closes at 4:00 p.m. CT, and a new “Part II” overflow thread posts at 4:00 p.m. CT as well.

New thread.

Via a Patrick Storm tweet: January 13th is bad for Houston pro sports fans. Yesterday, James Harden was traded (January 13th, 2021). January 13, 2020: Lunhow and Hinch fired. January 13, 2018: BoB given a contract extension.

Oof. We’ve hit the trifecta with NBA, MLB, and NFL! 🙁